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Wednesday, May 30, 2012

IMPD Handling of Bisard Evidence "Non-Issue" to Ballard

Mayor Greg Ballard

Greg Ballard sure comes off as arrogant sometimes.

When it came to light that the blood evidence in the David Bisard case was mishandled by the Indianapolis Metropolitan Police Department, there was a press conference and an investigation was launched. Chief Paul Ciesielski resigned, and people across media and political lines were calling for more heads to roll. It was only a short time before Public Safety Director Frank Straub announced he would be stepping down in August.

One of the people with the most right to be angry in this case, besides the victims and their families, was Terry Curry. The mishandled evidence at least could have helped his case against Bisard. Instead, since the blood evidence was moved without authorization and left unrefrigerated for five months.

In a recent letter to Ballard, Curry took IMPD to task for not following orders and mishandling the evidence. He suggested the removal of Straub immediately and the removal of other officials, according to WRTV.

When Greg Ballard, the Mayor of Indianapolis, the man whose self-proclaimed job has been to make public safety job one, was asked for a comment about the case by WRTV, he said, "I've got to tell you honestly, this is really a non-issue to me. I don't think this is an issue. I'm afraid we're hurting the families to be honest with you by keeping this sort of thing in the headlines."

This follows a pattern of other recent flippant and blasé quotes from the Mayor. In this case though, it seems particularly cruel. Ballard's IMPD mishandled this evidence, and that evidence can now not be used in the Bisard case. That could mean that, one way or another, justice will not be served. The nerve this Mayor must have to invoke "the families" involved in this case.

Yes, the families of Eric Wells, Mary Mills, and Kurt Weekly have suffered enough. When Bisard smashed his patrol car into them, Eric Wells lost his life and the lives of Mills and Weekly were altered permanently. They deserved to have IMPD conduct the best investigation possible, and Ballard's IMPD appears to have botched the case at many levels by its own admission.

Saying that "the families" don't deserve a proper investigation or swift action from Mayor Ballard to remove people that had responsibilities to make sure that investigation occurred is arrogant and disappointing at all levels and only feeds the perception that something untoward happened in this case.

It's pretty apparent that Ballard doesn't want to know the truth and doesn't have the necessary intestinal fortitude to take decisive action to prevent further mishandling of evidence in the future.